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Article

In Microfinance, Clients Must Come First

By: Srikant M. Datar, Marc J. Epstein and Kristi Yuthas

In the debate over whether microfinance works, few microfinance institutions articulate what, exactly, their ultimate goals are and how, exactly, they will achieve them. The authors cut through the confusion by mapping a clear theory of change for microfinance. If the... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Customer Focus and Relationships; Social Entrepreneurship; Microfinance; Goals and Objectives; Success; Social Enterprise; Poverty

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20 Apr 2015
News

"En Chile no toleran el fracaso tan bien"

07 Dec 2017
News

Can Index Funds Be a Force for Sustainable Capitalism?

16 Oct 2024
Video

A fireside chat with Sam Altman, OpenAI CEO at Harvard University

19 May 2020
Video

Getting to Know 2020 Class Day Student Speaker Claire Wagner

Research Summary

Dawn Matsumoto's research investigates managers' financial reporting decisions including the incentives driving these decisions and the impact of these decisions on capital market participants. She is interested in the role of financial intermediaries (such as... View Details

July 2012 (Revised August 2012)
Case

Friend Bank: The Time for Hope (Abridged)

By: Clayton Rose and Aldo Sesia

In 2010, Friend Bank was entering the fifth year of Hope Harris Johnson's ambitious 20-year growth plan to transform her family's one-branch community bank into an institution with a substantial presence in southeastern Alabama. Harris Johnson was pleased, so far, with... View Details

Keywords: Banking; Family Business; Strategy And Execution; Banks and Banking; Family Ownership; Financial Institutions; Strategy; Banking Industry; United States; Alabama

Reza Satchu is a Senior Lecturer in the Entrepreneurship Management Unit at the Harvard Business School where he teaches The Entrepreneurial Manager, The Founder Mindset and Founder Launch. He is also the Founder, Managing Partner and majority shareholder of... View Details

Research Summary

The Early Evolution of Business Groups: A Study of Diversification and Spinoffs by Vietnam's First Generation of Entrepreneurs

This study, done in collaboration with the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Central Institute for Economic Management, examines the experience of 95 successful Vietnamese entrepreneurs first surveyed in 1999. The project aims to build and analyze... View Details

2003
Case

Universitas 21 Global

By: Vijay Govindarajan and Chris Trimble

In a move that could redefine the future of higher education, Thomson Learning, in partnership with a worldwide consortium of universities, created a new institution of higher education, Universitas 21 Global (U21G), that had no campus, and no classrooms. It existed... View Details

Keywords: Online Technology; Expansion; Higher Education; Education Industry

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November 2005 (Revised March 2006)
Case

Nestle's Milk District Model: Economic Development for a Value-Added Food Chain and Improved Nutrition

By: Ray A. Goldberg and Kerry Herman

Nestle is the largest milk firm in the world. For over a century, it has developed a milk model procurement program that improved the well-being of the small-scale farmer and the ultimate consumer. Can it partner with other firms and institutions to make even greater... View Details

Keywords: Development Economics; Value Creation; Programs; Partners and Partnerships; Food and Beverage Industry

July 2007
Article

Cooperation between Corporations and Environmental Groups: A Transaction Cost Perspective

Theory suggests that when transaction costs are low, corporations and stakeholders can minimize social costs by transacting to their mutual advantage, but when transaction costs are high, reducing social costs requires the intervention of a centralized institution.... View Details

Keywords: Cost vs Benefits; Cost; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact; Business and Stakeholder Relations; Environmental Sustainability; Competitive Advantage; Cooperation

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October 1990 (Revised April 1998)
Case

John Smithers at Sigtek

Describes an ill-fated effort to institute a total quality program. Using the vantage point of one of the managers selected to be a quality instructor, the case traces the rise and fall of the quality effort during its very brief existence over the course of six... View Details

Keywords: Quality; Change Management; Performance

29 Jan 2013
News

Analysis: Immigration reform could boost U.S. economic growth

23 Mar 2009
News

Letting Ed Liddy Twist in the Wind

February 2017 (Revised January 2018)
Case

Womenomics in Japan

By: Boris Groysberg, Mayuka Yamazaki, Nobuo Sato and David Lane

This case profiles Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's vigorous attempts to revive Japan's economy, specifically by advocating for a larger role for women in the economy—not as a matter of social policy or gender equity per se, but as an essential element of any solution to... View Details

Keywords: Gender Equality; Japan; Leadership; Government-business Relations; Shinzo Abe; Economic Growth; Aging Society; Womenomics; Abenomics; Labor Market Discrimination; Workplace Culture; Women And Leadership; Change Management; Leading Change; Gender; Business and Government Relations; Growth and Development; Employment; Working Conditions